Life Panels.
The term Keith Olbermann decided to call the end of life counseling proposal in the health care reform bill. It is a great description of what the proposal will do, and it is a great term to be used when describing the proposal to your not so politically literate friend or relative.
But there was a point in Keith's special comment, where he asked all of us to stop and have the talk with your love ones, and find out what they want, and try to find out every resource you can, so that you may be completely prepared for when the day comes.
As he said, it is hard, it is accepting death, and it is not something you really want to talk about, but it is something we must all do.
It's a discussion we all must have, and it is one I had with my mother on the same night as the special comment.
I was watching Countdown as I normally do in the living room, my mother was in her room watching some movie on IFC, ever since we got cable back, she loves to watch IFC and Starz, in a weird mixture of independent films and big time hollywood releases.
It was getting near the end of his show, and he had started his special comment, my mom came out of her room to go get some food for her dog who just had pups, as always when Keith is talking about health care, I always make my mom stop and watch it with me. She, just like my father, seem intent on hating President Obama, and hating every legislation that is being pushed through Congress. I have to constantly set them straight on the latest rumors about what is going to happen when health care passes, and what the government is trying to do, and not do.
The best way to get through to my mom to box her in with logic, there is no one better to do that than Keith.
As we are watching, I began to describe to her what he was talking about, and what the Sarah Palin "death panels" really were, and as she seat there, she just agreed, and half-hearteningly watched. More concerned with getting the dog food,
"Kyle I don't have time for this"
"It will only be a couple minutes mom, just calm down."
We continued to watch, and I began to tell her that there is a time when we need to talk about this. She is a diabetic, and what you would considered one of the extreme cases. Her sugar jumps and flattens out in minutes. She is either having a sugar attack, where her sugar is getting near 300, or she is about to pass out with her sugar dropping as low as 40. It is scary, and we have to constantly have chocolate with us just in case her sugar just drops out and falls to near death levels.
We have no health insurance, and with her being on disability, she won't receive Medicare coverage for another year, so there is a good chance that she won't live to be 100 or anything like that. She is not very old, only 41, but she has pretty hit the point where she will be on the down hill side from here, and so it always concerns me how long before I have to deal with the truth we all deal with, that we all die, and we all must face that we will lose love ones.
As I begin the discussion with something simple,
"Mom, we are going to have to have this discussion one day, where we will need figure out what you will want me to do"
"Just let them pull the plug" She says, almost not even thinking about it.
"No, we need to really talk about it, what do you want to do, if you get sick, and can't wake up, or whatever happens?"
We went on for a little while, as it personally, and I don't really like to give out the details of everything we discussed, but it was good start on the discussions, and it is a good start on beginning to understand my instruction if something tragic happens in the near future.
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Time changes things, and I'm sure as she grows older, and so do I, our discussion about what to do will change, and her instructions will change, but it's good to get them now, just in case, God forbid, time isn't on our side.
Although this discussion was pretty much as informal as you can get, and pretty much as non-medical as you can get, it is was something. I hope that one day soon, we can have this discussion with a doctor, someone who can tell us the symptoms, the chances, the actions and reactions, etc. And I hope that one day, we can have that discussion and be able to bill the insurance company for that right.
As Keith said, it is a life panel. It gives family the chance to have life preserved, and have life saved from pain. It gives family a chance to understand what this means, and what that means, and understand what happens if we do this or if we do that. It should be a right for every family, and a right for every person.
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As I finished my discussion with my mom, she got up, and walked into the kitchen got the dog food, and came back in, she didn't say anything, so I had to ask,
"So you still scared of health care reform, because of the stupid ass lies people have been saying?" (Yes, I cuss around my mother, if you knew how many times me, my step-father, my mother, and my brother cussed in a day, you would understand).
It was followed by her favorite response when she doesn't want to admit something,
"I don't know, Kyle, just shut up about it, I don't like Obama, and I don't have too."
That was enough for me, I knew I got to her, and I knew that in the future these talks won't be so bad to have, and these talks won't be so hard to discuss. We have the foundation, we just have to build on it.
My next mission is my step-dad, although he is much better health, he has so much stress, that eventually it will all catch up with him. Heart problems run in his family, and I will have to ask him one day, what is it he wants to do when the time comes.
But your mission, for everyone that reads this, is to have this discussion with your loved ones. Sit them down, and just tell them, "We are having this discussion, we need to have it, and there is no way we can avoid it." It's tough, but it gets easier once you start talking about it. It gets easy once you get them talking, and gets easier once you figure out what they want, and how they want it.
It can be the difference from life and death. It can be the difference from making a terrible decision, and making one you will never regret.
In the night of death, hope sees a star, and listening love can hear the rustle of a wing.
-Robert Ingersoll